Hosted by the European University Institute (EUI), the EGPP Annual Conference 2025 brought together leading scholars, civil society actors, and policy experts to explore how democracies can counter rising autocratic tendencies. Across four engaging panels, participants examined institutional fragility, external influences, citizen mobilization, media manipulation, and the gendered dimensions of democratic backsliding.

Matej Bel University contributes to Panel III on “Citizens, movements, and democratic backsliding” with a presentation by Jozef Michal Mintal and Kamila Borseková titled “Gender fatigue? Framing and counter-framing gender in the struggle for equality,” a result of the BRRIDGE project’s collaboration between Matej Bel University and the University of Galway. Their research addressed how gender narratives are shaped and contested within increasingly polarized political environments.

In addition to panel contributions, our team also led several consortium working sessions focused on current project initiatives, scholarly collaborations, and forthcoming publications.